Differences over the scope for the talks have also cast doubts on whether it will still go ahead, keeping open the risk of U.S. military action.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, has vowed to unleash a regional war if America launches air strikes. Initially few in the Middle East seemed eager for further conflict. The region’s power-brokers tried to dissuade America from military action. But attitudes now look more mixed.

Iran requested to move talks from Turkey, Secretary of State Rubio confirms. Rubio laid out what topics needed to be discussed for a "meaningful" result.

WASHINGTON — Top Trump administration officials do not yet have clear guidance on what President Donald Trump would hope to accomplish with military action in Iran as U.S. and Iranian officials plan to meet Friday to try to avoid a war,

The authorities are making mass arrests, seizing assets and hunting down doctors who treated protesters. Some Iranians keep showing defiance anyway.

As EU designates Iran's IRGC as terrorist group, pressure mounts on U.K. to act as London center allegedly promoting Iranian regime propaganda.